LECOM NEWS

LECOM helps osteopathic medical colleges set new record for enrollment applications

The increase in medical school applications to LECOM is the highest among all osteopathic colleges.

The American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine (AACOM) reports that for the fifth straight year applications to osteopathic medical schools have risen to a new high. While nationally, the increase over last year is just above seven percent, applications to LECOM campuses in Erie and Greensburg, Pa. and Bradenton, Fla. have increased even more. Of more than 13,500 applicants to all osteopathic medical schools, 5410 included LECOM Erie/Greensburg among the schools where they applied– a 24 percent increase over last year. In Bradenton, the college received 4281 applications, up 18% from last year. These numbers are through January 28, 2011 and the applications will continue arriving through the first of April. LECOM will accept more than 500 students for medical school at its campuses.

The College offers innovative, affordable, student centered medical education that attracts applicants from nearly every state. LECOM also offers two, three-year accelerated programs for the osteopathic medical degree. Only one other college in the country offers a three-year curriculum for physician training. LECOM also has one of the lowest private medical school tuitions in the country. The College also offers a doctor of pharmacy degree and plans to open a school of dental medicine next year in Bradenton.

According to AACOM, as potential medical students learn more about becoming an osteopathic physician (DO), they are increasing their applications to osteopathic medical colleges. As of mid-January, with three months left to apply for the 2011 entering medical student class, the number of applicants to the nation’s 26 colleges of osteopathic medicine already has surpassed last year’s cycle-end total. More than 13,500 aspiring physicians have applied to the schools, 7.3 percent more than had applied at this time in the cycle last year.

Potential medical students have submitted more than 100,000 applications to the nation’s 26 osteopathic medical colleges; on average, the colleges are receiving approximately 20 applications for every available seat.

Every one of the colleges is recording increased numbers of applications this year, with growth in applications ranging from under 1 percent to more than 25 percent.

19,426 students are currently enrolled in an osteopathic medical college, a number that has nearly doubled since the year 2000.

More than 20 percent of new U.S. medical students are studying at osteopathic medical colleges.

By 2015, more than 5,300 osteopathic physicians will graduate from the nation’s osteopathic medical schools each year.

Growth in the number of osteopathic medical school graduates will help mitigate looming physician shortages, especially in the critical primary care area. DO students continue to pursue primary care fields (internal medicine, family medicine, pediatrics) in proportions surpassing those of their U.S.-trained MD colleagues.

The nation’s approximately 63,000 osteopathic physicians are fully licensed to practice the entire scope of modern medicine, bringing a patient-centered, holistic, hands-on approach to diagnosing and treating illness and injury.